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NEW DELHI: More than 20 years aft her marriage, Rousanara Begum yet heard the words she had waited for erstwhile the Supreme Court precocious ruled that a divorced Muslim pistillate tin reclaim the wedding gifts her parents gave her astatine the clip of marriage.Now astir 45, she told TOI connected Saturday: “It started 2 decades ago. I had to combat a batch for the victory.” For her, the SC’s determination is not conscionable a ineligible victory. It is the closing of a coiled she has carried since 2005. Rousanara was hardly joined erstwhile her marital beingness collapsed. According to her lawsuit records, she was joined successful 2005 but the narration fell isolated astir immediately.By precocious 2005, the archetypal cracks had appeared. In 2008, aft allegations of dowry harassment, intelligence cruelty, and being forced retired of her marital home, she returned to her parents.
The talaq yet came successful 2011. The gifts her begetter had fixed -- 7 lakh rupees successful currency and immoderate golden that were portion of her wedding -- were ne'er returned to her. “(Rs) Seven lakh is simply a batch of wealth for folks similar us,” she said successful breached Urdu.Unlike galore families who fearfulness the societal judgement that comes with a daughter’s divorce, her parents stood rock-solid down her. However, contempt winning successful the little courts much than once, Rousanara’s combat ran into a partition astatine Calcutta HC, which successful Jan 2024 reversed the earlier orders and denied her the close to reclaim the currency and golden her parents had fixed erstwhile she married.
HC ruled successful favour of the divorced husband, SK Salahuddin.
This prompted Rousanara to determination the SC.Through the years of litigation, Rousanara rebuilt her beingness adjacent arsenic she walked successful and retired of courtrooms. Today she works arsenic a superior schoolhouse teacher successful a govt school, is remarried, and has 2 sons.For her lawyer, Syed Mehdi Imam, it is 1 of the astir meaningful victories helium has seen. “This was a grey area. Till today, nary wide judgement existed connected whether the wealth and golden fixed to a bride astatine marriage, but kept with the groom, indispensable beryllium returned aft divorce,” helium told TOI. “I urged the court: determine this erstwhile and for all.” Imam said determination was hesitation successful immoderate quarters due to the fact that the substance could person been misread arsenic a spiritual flashpoint. “There could perchance person been pushback from immoderate corners,” helium said. “Some feared it could flare into a spiritual contention since this contented had ne'er been adjudicated before. It could person blown retired of proportionality arsenic it was sensitive.” Then, yet connected Dec 2, SC placed equality and dignity astatine the bosom of its mentation of the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights connected Divorce) Act, observing that instrumentality indispensable beryllium work successful airy of the lived experiences of women, particularly successful agrarian and small-town India, wherever patriarchal favoritism remains embedded.Muslim bodies person welcomed the ruling. Maulana Raziul Islam Nadwi, nationalist caput of JIH and its Shari’ah Council, said, “Husband’s gifts to the wife, adjacent if the matrimony does not last, cannot beryllium taken backmost nether Islamic law. Women’s gifts person a antithetic status. Shari’at gives the woman this right, unless she oregon her household willingly relinquishes it. There is nary contradiction successful the SC order.” When the verdict came, Imam typed 3 words to her during the tribunal luncheon break: “Won the matter.” That night, his telephone rang. She was successful tears. “I americium precise happy,” she said. “This triumph is for each Muslim women similar me.” For galore divorced Muslim women crossed India, this lawsuit from agrarian Bengal is simply a precedent: 1 that yet clarifies that what is fixed to a bride astatine matrimony belongs to her alone.
